What happens when a celebrity steps out of line? Everyone feels free to tell them they are bad role models. Tariana Turia, was not the only one to get verbally flogged for "doing the wrong thing" and "being a bad role model" by not vaccinating her grandchildren with the MeNZB vaccine. Troy Flavell also got on the wrong side of the Meningitis Trust for refusing to vaccinate his children as well. Letters flew thick and fast with parents dumping on him in the press.
So what did the Meningitis Trust do? They rolled out Carlos Spencer instead, because he was prepared to spout the right words!
I believe any campaign that doctors promote using the celebrity culture in order to create compliance, is rotten to the core.
The only ethically honest way to allow parents to make a decision is to publish ALL the facts for all to see.
Is the tide turning? Tapu Misa is one of the first newspaper writers to take the blinders off and have a really good look at a few facts relating to Herceptin, and what did she uncover? That Herceptin's manufacturers just might have cooked the books:
"..., this is based on the small FinHer trial, but it's a trial nonetheless that's regarded as scientifically robust and has fully reported its results and methodology, unlike the three larger studies funded by Herceptin's maker, Roche. None of these has published individual results that would allow scientific scrutiny and peer review.
A recent article in the Lancet claimed that Herceptin as used throughout much of the world is much less effective than thought because important clinical data from 1000 women has been omitted from published results, resulting in "publication bias".
As the Lancet's editor Richard Horton has noted, some crucial data on side-effects was missing, and the fact that results from two of the three trials had been combined suggest "that neither trial alone would demonstrate a positive result".
Why does Roche push the 12-month regime? Why not nine weeks or even six months?
The answer seems obvious, but perhaps I'm a little too inclined to cynicism where drug companies are concerned."
Her last sentence though shows that even she didn't quite have the bravery to call a spade a spade.
So let's call a spade, a spade. Who made Vioxx? Merck. Who made Gardasil? Merck. Anyone with an ear to the news knows that Merck lied right throughout the pre-license period about Vioxx, and wrote fraudulent ghost-written trials. Yet how is it that people who might know that, then presume that Merck's Gardasil data is lily white?
What if everyone analysed comments like these, made by Dr Broker, President of the International Papillomavirus Society:
“From a purely business point of view, they’ve [Merck] been facing some real interesting challenges over the Vioxx issue and they are looking at this Gardasil® as the foundation and the saviour of the company. Believe me, they have a huge stake in this, just as we all do.”
What exactly, is everyone's "stake" in Gardasil? Merck's "foundation and saviour" from what exactly? Exactly what is riding on the back of Gardasil? Mightn't that be even more of an incentive to cover up problems? Is that why every single side effect to Gardasil is dismissed as coincidental? Is Gardasil really the source of the money to Help Pay for Vioxx? In my opinion, this is why the vaccine debate has become a celebrity competition. Promoting the "feel good" factor, validating "trust the doctors", is a safer method of persuasion than allowing truth it's place in the mid-day sun. As Churchill once said during the war, "The truth is so valuable it needs to be protected by a wall of lies."
This is not "conspiracy" but real life. Dr Broker inferred it, not me.
